Next to Nothing
by Felix McKraken
Summary: Reno loses the will to continue living as a normal person, and begins to break down completely.


A/N: Old fic. Started Wednesday, September 27, 2000 10:16:16 PM according to my computer's clock. Finished Thursday, November 20, 2003 8:49:50 PM according to my computer's clock. Wowsers Trousers.  
  
**Next to Nothing**  
  
"Reno, I'm sick of this," he said, the anger overflowing him this time. This time I was driving him to the edge; this time I could feel his sternness and, for the first time, his true emphasism upon his meaning behind it. He _was_ sick of this, but still I continued. I continued with the only thing I had left.  
  
I simply replied, "Reno, I'm sick of this." He was frustrated beyond any point I had ever made him before. Before it was such trivial things...coming to work late, leaving early, not completing a report on time. These games though, these child games, he could not stand because it was these simple games where he could not break or bend the rules. It was an area that he could not touch, the very last I had of my own, for he had taken everything else. He picked me up and slammed my body against the wall, but I merely blinked, not giving him the slightest satisfaction of a flinch.  
  
He growled and finally screamed, "Why are you doing this!? Is this the only thing you can do!?" I paused and considered this question. The problem he had was that he was not asking the correct questions.  
  
At last he had found, or reached, a point in his interrogation where I could honestly answer and have a tiny bit of backing to it, "Yes."  
  
He blinked and paused, not expecting me to _not_ repeat his phrase. He slowly let my feet return to the floor and he stood back, "What do you mean by that?" Suddenly something inside of me turned and lurched in disgust, as if you would if you had been a young child watching a medical operation commence.  
  
I stood up tall, correcting my posture, "Thirteen and twelve is 156. Thirteen and thirteen is 169. Thirteen and fourteen is 182..." He pushed me over and I made no attempt to catch myself, there was no need. I gazed up at him and explored his deep, icy eyes. "What now, Rufus? What are you going to do that you haven't already done?" I spoke calmly, tilting my head to the side and raising an eyebrow, "Can't you be original?" He released what seemed to be a mixture of a sigh and growl from his throat as he picked me up and proceeded to carry me away to some room of his house. He finally placed me upon a bed which I assumed was his, but I said nothing more. He layed down beside me and copied my actions by staring at the ceiling.  
  
"What are you thinking about?" he asked after some time, I knew this was the one thing he never knew about me. He knew everything else. _Everything._ He knew it and he owned it and he sucked the life out of it as the mako reactors do to the Planet. And I let him. I played his game. I toyed with my own mind to make sure he would win. I was my own pawn in a chess game I had designed to purposely induce a check mate while masking it as if I was actually attempting to win. Was that what truely happened or was it the stress that had forced me to believe a lie?  
  
I finally answered his question with one of my own, "What are _you_ thinking about?" I could tell he moved for the bed slightly tremored and the cotton sheets made a soft swishing noise. He was gathering his thoughts, but I knew he had no intention of answering me except to prod more out of my depths. And it had become harder for him to as well. It was as if digging a hole, for the deeper you go, the harder it is to work further and further, and the more difficult it is to remove yourself from that hole. He questioned me again as predicted, therefore the same sentence was asked thrice. I decided that was enough, but I paused long enough to gain enough strength to tell him the truth.  
  
"What I think about is...how barren the ceiling looks. I look at it and think how plain, untouched, and pure it is. I think about how I envy it and how I wish I could be looked at and not touched and not affected by anything short of a natural disaster. I think how plain and barren I am as I am stripped of everything I can think of, save one thing." Rufus sat up and looked down upon me. For some reason, I had a feeling as though no matter what physical position either of us was in he was always above me. Looming over me like a vulture does its prey, waiting to feast upon it as soon as its life force fades. But this was only a half-truth for me, I had tricked the president to believe I was still alive, as I had done to the rest of the world.  
  
"You think of that?" he asked in a voice that indicated he was either not believing me or he found it extremely dull.  
  
"Yes," I replied simply, still staring at the ceiling above me.  
  
"Why?" his question weighed well so I gladly answered.  
  
"Why not?" I responded, and as simple as it was, it summarized all the answers into one compact phrase. He somehow accepted this and lied back down again.  
  
After another moment he asked, "What else do you think about?"  
  
I shifted into a more comfortable position and said, "Sometimes...instead of thinking...I don't think at all." He gazed at me skeptically as I could tell through my perephrial vision. If I felt any sort of energy I might have nodded to emphasize my point, but instead, I just continued, "I just stare. And stare. And don't think about anything, really."  
  
Rufus wasn't an easy believer and so he immediately asked, "You don't think about _anything_?"  
  
I shrugged now, and gave a small nod, "Yes. I mean, _why_ must we always think? I didn't believe there was any real reason, so I decided to stop thinking. And I did. For awhile."  
  
Impatient, the blond interrupted me, "And then?"  
  
I paused just to add the suspense effect for him, "And then...I began thinking again."  
  
Rufus sighed and relaxed, in a disappointed tone he released a quiet, "Oh." After some more thought he rolled over and turned to me, "Why are you so insistant on everything you do now?"  
  
I shrugged and searched the barren wall for something nonexistant, just searching for general interest, "I don't think I'm insistant. I'm just...doing." He leaned over me so I could only gaze at his perfectly chiseled face. What a damn trick he was; one moment he looked so innocent, and the next he could cause you to seethe with so much anger that you wished to spit upon him. And I wasn't ever sure what his intentions were, so I didn't bother to guess or speculate.  
  
"If you could..." he began slowly, his eyelids closing about half way, "Would you commit suicide?" This idea was not a first to me, in fact, I had been keeping that as an option since our game had begun. Now, though, it was different, the despair had changed into something I wasn't sure how to describe.  
  
"I suppose I would," I answered flatly, giving no emotion in my tone or in my looks.  
  
And somehow I could tell that he knew what I was saying was the truth: I _would_ commit suicide if I had the chance. He gave another sigh and he gazed at me, "And why would you do that? Isn't there something to live for?"  
  
I closed my eyes. I silently sighed and replied, "That's a good question."  
  
He continued his questions, "Well..why do people live their lives? Why can't you be like them?"  
  
I was irritated by this question and so I gladly answered it, "Because they're fools. They run their little lives on such trivial things. They always must run about..and have rules for what they can say in front of certain people, and regulations, and guidelines..people depend on money...but money isn't real..it's paper and metal that they deem to have value when indeed there's no value in anything but objects that people make have value. The real value is sentimental value, and since that changes from person to person, society has composed greed to fix that. Money spawned from gold and silver, which is nothing more than some shiny object that people were facinated with. And they run about with their money, and their wish for it. Their greed and selfishness driving them on the be rich and famous and to be better than everyone else, and to become corrupt, which has no real meaning because they don't do anything. They just bitch and worry and accomplish nothing.  
  
"People run about..and go to school unwillingly, and then they grow up and get a job that they don't want but are pressured to go because of society, and then they go home and bitch about it, and they do this day after day, after day with no meaning except to make money. And then they fall in love, or lust, because love doesn't exist in those who are so blind. And they find a mate and they reproduce and bring a being into life who is born into a bondage that no one can see, because of what society has done to itself. Everyone is blind, and the blind is leading the blind. And then, there are some strange occurances, that by chance, a person escapes those chains that people have placed upon them. The chains that say 'don't do this, it's not right' or 'do this, this is how you do it,' but..are those the ways to really accomplish anything? You're living off of rules that other people have built for control because of their selfishness. You're submitting, they're submitting and giving in their power for material possesions that are bought with money. And they run around their whole life just living and not doing. That's why I can't go back."  
  
Rufus took this in and blinked slowly, "Why can't you go back?"  
  
I breathed for a few moments to calm myself, "For one, this world is not ready for such...it's not ready. Two, it takes a person living _and_ doing. I'm only doing. I can't go back." He then looked down into my eyes and by his expression it told me that he understood. Somehow, by looking into my eyes, he could see who I really was. Not who I had been. I was an empty shell now, a person with no body, no soul, no spirit, but only a mind. A tortured mind which, with difficulty, protected itself from being torn away as the other elements that made me had been. My thoughts were all I had now, and my emotions didn't even matter to me.  
  
I think it was difficult for Rufus to understand the fact that without inspiration, without wanting something of any sort, you didn't desire life. You had no meaning and no purpose, it wasn't an easy thing to absorb, and it certainly wasn't easy to be at the crossroads, such as I was. I was to the point where my life meant nothing, and therefore taking it would be of no great hassle except for the fact that I found no reason why I should commit suicide. I didn't know what it would accomplish to end my existance, but I knew how my life was set out in front of me and it was so blank and confusing that I would have to stop thinking about it.  
  
I didn't really have the option; I was pressed into the future.  
  
The days passed by as if repeating themselves. I felt like I was on a record that had been placed on an old phonograph; the needle jumping so slightly to keep the song in a loop. Rufus tried three more times to bring me back to his world. It merely plummeted me further into my current beliefs. It was hopeless. I was hopeless. He was hopeless. We were hopeless. Rude, Tseng, Elena, AVALANCHE, Sephiroth...they were all hopeless. Everyone. Every last person on the Planet was hopeless. We had all given up our individulaity to be part of the group, to become part of the whole. We sold our soul without ever knowing why we were doing it. Society was cold and cruel, I didn't understand why so many people wanted to be part of it. I guess it was for the weak. For the foolish to cling onto and feel safe, welcome, and accepted. Or maybe it was an excuse for dishonorable actions.  
  
I began to visit the slums day after day. Each day I stayed longer and longer, just wandering and overlooking the city. I felt so small, so insignificant. I felt helpless, almost stunned. I found a playground in one of the sectors and I frequented there. I would sit on a bench and stare for hours at a time, just thinking.  
  
I looked across the scenery again even though I've analyzed it plenty of times. This time I noted the lack of natural beauty. In Wutai they had parks with trees and grass. Sometimes a river flowed through it and they'd build a bridge across so you could gaze out over the water and see the natural gold as the sun's rays were reflected by the running liquid. It was autumn now, months had gone by since the game with Rufus had begun. I turned my thoughts away from him, finding more interest in the season. In Midgar it was dark and gloomy every day. The pollution was outstanding, turning the normal, smooth, blue sky into a smog of greenish toxins.  
  
I wasn't lucky enough to be outside of the city during the fall, but I've heard from those who have that the leaves on the trees would change color. Though in Midgar, we were lucky to even have a tree. I tried to imagine how it would look to walk down a path in a forest in autumn -- the leaves splotched in bright yellows, creamy oranges, and deep reds, some wilting, brown, and falling as a wind forced its way through - pushing the dry objects to the ground, rustling quietly. I instantly felt the need to see this sight, but I pushed away the human urge and continued to sit there, unmoving. By this time there were many park goers and the sun was still up, keeping most of the criminals away until the shelter of night shielded them.  
  
That's when I came to the realization. It happened so abruptly it took the breath out of me. Unbidden it raced across my brain, making it the focus of my attention so completely, so thoroughly, I forgot everything else.  
  
I was scared of life. The whole thing..I was scared of it. Scared to be somebody because I was someone once, and look what happened when I lost that. What would happen next time? I'd lose my mind. There would be nothing left of me. But that didn't have to happen. It was like playing chess then finding out you're playing checkers. It's so simple. It's so clear.  
  
I was still clinging to my individuality. Still clinging to _life_.  
  
There was a chance for me to be Reno again. There was a chance for me to be a human like I was. There was a chance for me to play my own game.  
  
There was hope yet. 


End file.
